Mental Health Awareness Week 2023.

To help raise awareness, we will be posting a daily resource from some of our favourite pioneers who are challenging the way we think about and treat mental health and anxiety.

To get the ball rolling, here is some background on anxiety:

Anxiety is a perfectly natural and normal reaction that lives within all of us. It’s a human emotion that can spur us on, keep us alert and safe and even motivate us towards a goal. However, when overused and out of control, no matter how confident, educated, famous, competent, brave or strong someone seems, anxiety can be hiding under the surface, causing all manner of difficulties. Biochemically, anxiety is a combination of hormones and neurotransmitters called Epinephrine and Norepinephrine which are responsible for the adrenaline and energy that gets pumped through our bodies. It’s an essential human function that we all need to perform and even survive but when it takes over it becomes the inner battle that some are fighting but no one can see.

• Regularly feeling nervous, restless, frustrated and irritated
• Difficulty concentrating
• Feeling twitchy, agitated and fearful
• Increased heart rate, headaches, muscle aches and a churning stomach

Anxiety becomes a problem when the above symptoms last longer than expected after a stressful situation has ended. It can become more severe over time and limit our ability to do something or live a life that’s free from worry.

Anxiety isn’t a disease or lifetime curse, it can be a temporary condition that is manageable and curable with the right approach and strategy that works for the individual. We’re not saying that there’s a magic wand, or an easy solution that’s guaranteed to cure it. Managing anxiety is as personal to those who are suffering depending upon the reason they have the condition in the first place, but there are proven strategies that can help ease the chaos we feel when anxiety takes hold.

It is Mental Health Awareness week and to kick off our five days of useful resources, we are going to take a look at our beloved colour energies and what triggers stress for each.

Stress. We all feel it and we all need an appropriate amount of it to perform. However, when we experience, translate, or expose ourselves to stressful situations that push us over the edge, that healthy dose of stress turns into distress. That Is when anxiety shifts from keeping us safe, to eating away at us.

The Insights Discovery model helps us understand behaviour - what drives it, how it’s perceived and what typically triggers stress for the dominant styles of personality.

Today's resource is a practical activity.

The term ‘Mental Health’ is being challenged by sector specialists from psychotherapy, psychiatry, and biological and neurological backgrounds. The more research that surfaces, the stronger the evidence becomes that our mental health is heavily related to our biological, physiological and neurological well-being.

Anxiety can occur anywhere, but typically when we are faced with stressful situations ranging from open or small spaces, meetings or difficult people to social situations and presentations where that destructive inner voice can whisper in our ear ‘you don’t belong here’, or ‘you are not enough’.

🌬 B – Breathe. When feeling anxious, our breath becomes short and shallow, starving the brain of much-needed oxygen. By turning our focus to the breath we shift our attention inwardly and by regulating the breath we create stability. By breathing out for longer than we breathe in we stimulate the parasympathetic system (responsible for rest and digest) which is the counterbalance to the sympathetic system (responsible for activation, or fight and flight)

🚶‍♀️ E – Exercise. Getting up and moving around when feeling anxious releases muscle tension and lowers the body’s contribution to the overwhelming emotion. Also, when moving your body, you naturally release feel-good neurochemicals into your brain such as dopamine, serotonin, noradrenaline and endorphins – the rest and revive chemicals.

👌 A – Accept. Taking control of your inner voice and changing the language helps the rational part of your brain step in. We can typically only focus on one internal message at a time, so changing the dialogue from self-deprecating to a non-judgemental message that allows emotions to wash over it eases the pressure we put ourselves under.

👣 T -Transcend. When feeling overwhelmed or out of control through anxiety, taking a minute to mindfully engage with all five senses grounds us to the present moment – we all like a bit of control and when experiencing a panic attack or spell of anxiety the fear of not knowing where the emotion is going can cause more upset.

So next time you feel the rising tide of an emotional response that might lead to feeling anxious, practice the above process and BEAT it into the ground!!!

If you haven’t experienced the severity of anxiety or its impact, it can be difficult to walk in the shoes of those who do and challenging to help them navigate their way through a working day. To add to the complexity, anxiety can be situational, social or high-functioning which means although a colleague can be seen as confident in meetings or speaking publicly, their anxiety disorder kicks in when in small groups, or with those they don’t know.

1. Do not assume.

If a colleague tells you that they have a general anxiety disorder do not assume that it’s the same for everyone. Don’t watch them as if they’re about to explode, and if you do see something that might lead you to believe they’re feeling anxious, don’t say ‘are you feeling anxious’ – that can only make things worse. Find out when and where they might feel the anxiety and ask them if there’s any particular way they would like to be helped if it occurs.

2. Be kind

People who suffer from anxiety tend to become more anxious about the anxiety than what triggers it in the first place. Have an open-door policy and let them know you’re there for support, a walk and a non-judgemental listening ear – when suffering from anxiety people can go inwards and not open up about their challenges easily.

3. Get to know the signs

When suffering from anxiety people’s behaviour will let you know. If they’ve shared information with you as mentioned in point one, you’ve got a head start. However, watch out for increased levels of nervousness, fidgeting, rapid breathing, increased perspiration or if they are having trouble focusing on one thing at a time, making decisions or getting easily tired.

4. Check-in

Supporting someone with anxiety isn’t just about being there for them when they have an attack. Anxiety can be eased over time with reassurance and encouragement but it’s unlikely they will come to you as frequently as they might need to. So check in regularly and let them know you’re there.

5. Go the extra mile

You might not be their leader, manager or even on their team but helping them with any worries or fears might help ease the anxiety. This could be anything from concerns around workplace relationships to career prospects and job security. If someone has a general anxiety disorder, what might be a small issue for others can cause all manner of issues for them

6. Step-in

If a colleague has an anxiety or panic attack whilst with you then step in and:

• Stay calm
• Move them to a quiet place
• Use short, clear simple sentences
• Help regulate their breathing using a count of 4 on the in-breath, and 7 on the out breath
• Use the 3 3 3 rule. Focus on, and share 3 things they can see, 3 things they can hear and then 3 body parts they can move
• Get them some water, and stay with them until it has passed

Always recommend that they seek further professional advice from their GP or a professional body like Mind, The Mental Health Foundation, Samaritans or The Campaign Against Living Miserably.

Over the week, LinkedIn has been lit up with people sharing their personal stories of how anxiety and mental health has impacted their life. We’ve been humbled by the openness and honesty these courageous contributors have shown to raise awareness on subjects that only a few years ago would’ve been buried.

Over the last week we have shared posts on:

👉 Monday: Identifying stressful triggers and managing reactions ‘colourfully’

👉 Tuesday: Mental Health OR Brain Health – an alternative perspective

👉 Wednesday: BEAT it – a practical, in-the-moment technique to manage anxiety and panic attacks

👉 Thursday: How to help someone at work with anxiety

First and foremost, there’s nothing more beneficial than talking to another human being about your thoughts, feelings, memories and current situation. However, engaging in daily practices that support our mental health by reframing thoughts and training our physiology and biology to manage an overload of stress is a very beneficial way of building the foundations.

Over the last few years there’s been a rise in apps that help achieve this goal. They’re accessible, easy to use and can be listened to and watched anywhere, on the train or between meetings, through guided practices, mindfulness and meditation (don’t be put off by that, meditation is something that we can all do without sitting in the lotus position or floating to a place of higher purpose and enlightenment!)